01.Introduction

Bread making at home is becoming more popular again, and it’s not surprising - there’s nothing quite like the smell, taste and texture of a freshly baked loaf of bread from your own kitchen.

It’s also reassuring to know exactly what ingredients go into the bread you eat, particularly if you’re avoiding or reducing certain ingredients such as gluten or salt - the latter of which is often unnecessarily high in many supermarket breads.

But not everyone has the time or patience to mix, knead, rise, knock back, prove, knead again, and then wait anxiously to see if that lovingly leavened loaf will be a crusty delight or a failed flat slab. That's where a breadmaker comes in. Whether you want to remove as much human error from the process as possible, save time and money, or simply wake up to a kitchen fragrant with fresh baking smells, a breadmaker might be the answer - and it could even pay for itself within a few months.

Brands and models tested

How we test

Making bread from scratch/pre-mix
CHOICE’s Home Economist, Fiona Mair, makes a 1kg loaf of multigrain bread from scratch with each machine following the manufacturer’s instructions.

She also compares the machines’ performance when making 1kg wholemeal multigrain loaves from a Laucke pre-mix.

Where available, Fiona uses the breadmaker’s instructions for the pre-mix; otherwise, she uses the pre-mix manufacturers’ instructions.

Fiona visually assesses the loaves for even crust colour, shape, uniformity of mixing, grain distribution, crust, and crumb texture, looking for small and evenly distributed bubbles.

Ease of use
Fiona notes how easy the bread tins are to remove and replace, how easy it is to remove the loaf, how intuitive the controls, labels and features are, and how easy the machines are to clean.

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